Watsonville >> Music is a constant thread running through Sena Knornschild's colorful life.

She has performed in bands, collected traditional American songs and written a few herself. While working 20 years with the county Office of Education, she taught disabled children through music. She's played her guitar and accordion in retirement homes, at county fairs and on the radio.

"Music really is magic," declares the Watsonville resident. "It gets to the soul."

At nearly 93, Sena is trim and graceful. She does weekly yoga and water aerobics, attends "90s Club" gatherings at the Mid-County Senior Center and performs in the center's monthly Choraliers musical shows.

Her busy life started early. The youngest of six children, Sena grew up in western Colorado and took care of her mother, who was in a wheelchair due to rheumatoid arthritis. Her father, a coal miner-turned-farmer, traded a plow for an ornate pump organ.

"Mom played violin, and she and Dad were always singing," Sena recalls. "We'd all gather to sing around that pump organ — it's in my living room now."

She inherited her mother's knack for music, learning the keyboard and getting her first guitar at 12. Her childhood sweetheart, Russell Rheuby, was also musical. After marrying in 1939 and moving to California for his work, they formed a trio and later a larger band, The Serenaders, playing for years around the Bay Area.

Sena founded another band years later, after Russell and her second husband, Frank Knornschild, died; while volunteering at the Watsonville Senior Center, she met several retired musicians and organized The Silvertones, a group that performed for 20 years.

But perhaps Sena's most generous musical gift is something she started as a child, writing down songs she heard. By 1967 she had built a binder of 232 songs, from hymns to heartfelt ballads, titled "A Family Album of Songs." Photographs decorate the pages: her mother playing violin, all six children on a mule, Sena's son Alan dressed as a cowboy.

"I made each of my siblings a book," Knornschild says, opening the thick volume of handwritten music and lyrics. She smooths a page: "Here's a song in my mother's own writing."

Sena recorded three hours of music from the song book — "with a little cassette player, in my living room" — and transferred it to four CDs.

"All music is good music. I like songs that tell a story," she says. "I just want to preserve these songs and hope people will enjoy them."

Born: May 5, 1921, in Paonia, Colo. 'Paonia was supposed to be "peony" but they misspelled it.'

What's in a name: 'Sena is short for Asenath, Joseph's wife in the Bible.'

Early memory: 'The crunch of wagon wheels in the snow as Dad came home from the mine.'

Fish story: She and second husband Frank fished salmon commercially on their own trawler.

Making music: 'I collect instruments like a dog collects fleas.' She has an accordion, guitar and electric guitar, harmonica, pump organ, mandolin, ukulele and Chinese fiddle.

Favorite instrument: 'A Spanish-made Contessa guitar I've had 40 years. And carting around a 22-pound accordion is a little hard but I still do it.'